BEHAVIORAL HEALTH : CONTINUED
recalled Dr . Cody , who has seen immense changes since bringing on Reeves to her practice . “ Sometimes , patients can name that they ’ re having anxiety and depression or other mental health issues . Sometimes , it will hide behind some other physical symptom . Once such a need arises in a patient , he or she is often reluctant to therapy . Having Reeves in-house helps lessen patient fear .”
Dr . Gibson elaborated , “ Reeves was part of the Hillcrest clinic five days per week while under the CPC + program , but that had to be reduced to 1.5 days per week after the program ended . When they tried to move him from her clinic , he was such a priority to Dr . Cody that she restructured her clinic to keep him . It speaks to the fact that once the primary care doctor has someone like that , it makes such a difference for their patients .”
Clearly , CPC + funding enabled these physicians and others from across the state the opportunity for this integrated model of care . That funding ended on 12 / 31 / 21 , and as a result , some clinics have lost their therapists , either partially or completely . “ It always comes back to financing ,” said Dr . Gibson . “ It gets looked at like it ’ s dessert and not a main-course part of health care , but statistics show that doctors and patients are happier , and patients get better – not only their mental health , but their physical health – if you treat their mental health and their stress .”
Other clinics are part of a hospital system and seem to be faring better . Dr . Gibson said some of these include clinics in the Baptist system , UAMS , the White River Medical system , and the VA Medical Centers .
Baptist ’ s program is an example of a working system that started with CPC + funding and has continued to expand post-initiative . Rick Tyler , MD , directed the CPC + program for all 48 Baptist system
Statistics show that doctors and patients are happier , and patients get better – not only their mental health , but their physical health – if you treat their mental health and their stress .
clinics and continues to be over the system ’ s value-based care programs . He said , “ Around five years ago , we started integrating licensed clinical social workers into our primary care practices to provide a variety of services .”
Like within the clinics mentioned above , patients benefited from counselors who were available in-house . “ It was convenient ,” continued Dr . Tyler , “ and our goal was to expand as much as we could with the money being provided through the CPC + program . We were able to cover eight clinics at one time , but with 48 clinics , the question was how to scale up and provide the same level of integrated primary care services for numerous clinics across the state .”
At Dr . Gibson ’ s recommendation , Baptist settled on a form of integrated behavioral health known as collaborative comanagement ( CoCM ), which offers mental health services in a virtual environment . “ An outsourced company provides mental health care
40 THE JOURNAL OF THE ARKANSAS MEDICAL SOCIETY